Many people within the motor vehicle industry were expecting to see Electric Vehicles high on the agenda in the Chancellor’s budget but were left disappointed.
In the months building up to the Spring budget there had been calls for incentives to get more buyers behind the wheels of electric vehicles instead of petrol or diesel models.
Many had also expected Jeremy Hunt to announce that any new commercial properties would from now on have to install electric car charger points at their premises but neither of these got a mention.
In fact, electric vehicles didn’t get a look in and the only nod to motorists was that fuel duty wouldn’t now rise as planned later this month. For the next 12 months the 5p cut will remain too, with the Chancellor saying it would save the average driver £100 next year and around £200 since the 5p cut was introduced. £200m in funding to tackle potholes on the UK roads was also announced.
So, there is some good news for motorists, all be it from an industry perspective – not everything we wanted to see. Across the wider industry though there is positive news as consumer confidence looks like it’s growing.
Despite the fact there’s an ongoing cost of living crisis the latest figures show that new car registrations are already on the up – which is great news for our industry.
February is usually slower as people wait for the new plates to come out but last month’s figures actually showed an increase of more than 26%.
The Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders statistics have revealed that new car registrations rose to nearly 75,000 last month.
A breakdown of the figures looks like this:
- Hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs) recorded the most significant growth of all fuel types, up 40.0%
- Petrol was up by 35.8%
- Electric vehicles (BEVs) were up 18.2% with 12,310 new electric cars sold, compared with 10,417 in February 2022. It actually accounts for one in six new UK car registrations.
- Plug-in hybrids rose 1.0% to 4723.
- Diesel registrations actually fell by 7.0%.
As was well publicised at the time, the pandemic and lockdown slowed supply chain down hugely but with that situation now easing figures aren’t much off what they were pre-pandemic.
Adept Director Carl Cumbo said: “It is so encouraging that the UK automotive sector is holding up against a back-drop of continued difficult supply and market conditions particularly when you look at figures for the more environmentally friendly vehicles. We were disappointed that the UK car market wasn’t specifically mentioned in the budget as we feel it’s incredibly important that the Government continue to do all they can to support it. Ideally, we wanted to see a commitment to investing in a robust public charging network to lead the charge towards zero emission motoring – we hope that’s something we see in a future budget or future Governmental support.”
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